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Hejarin Longborn
Hejarin Longborn is a human (1/8 elf) rogue and Vincent Longborn's twin. Conned people with Radaya Shakur back in the day. Character sheet History For family past, see Vincent Longborn#History. When the twins were around seven, the budding scamster Hejarin had a con he'd run several times; it usually pulled in enough money for them to eat for a while. All he had to do was dress as respectably as he could manage and fill a glass bottle with colored water. Then he'd sprint down the street and engineer a bump into someone who looked well-to-do, dropping and shattering the bottle in the collision. Hej would then burst into tears: "My mommy's sick and that was the potion that would save her! Now she'll die and I'll be all alone!" Normally, this would elicit sympathy from the mark, who'd give him money for a "replacement potion." But this time, it didn't go quite that way. The man offered to take the boy home, just a few blocks away, to fetch enough money to really help out his poor family. Hej, a little wary but also made greedy by the man's obvious wealth, went with him. When he stepped inside the door to an opulent building, he took a sap to the back of the head and was out cold. When he came to, he was bound and gagged in a dark space. He was bouncing around a bit; he must be in the back of a wagon or something. The only way he could move was by wiggling around, so he did that. He was enclosed in some kind of large box, it seemed, which was half-full of something small and round...onions? But before long, he bumped into someone else, who moved with a sudden start. It was pitch-dark and both of them were gagged, though, so beyond guessing that it was a girl a little older than him he had no idea what was happening. Unable to talk or, really, do anything, they both fell into a fitful sleep before long. It went on like this for an eternity. In the dark, there was no way to tell time, and they couldn't make out the occasional murmured voices. He and the girl couldn't communicate, but they were reassured by each other's presence. Finally, after a long time – long enough that he was sure he would shrivel up if he didn't get some water soon – light! He and the girl looked at each other for a brief, terrified moment, and then a bag came down over his head. He was placed roughly in another, smaller box and carried somewhere, then set down. Exhausted, and desolated that his only companion had been taken from him, he fell asleep. When he woke he heard noises nearby, and was just able to make out the sound of voices, and...applause? With a lurch in his stomach, he realized what had happened: he had been kidnapped for a Theater of the Real, places that the older kids said noblemen watched plays that ended in the violent on-stage deaths of street kids who were dumb enough to get caught. He was terrified, but still bound tightly. Before long, the lid of the box he was in flew open. As his eyes adjusted to the sudden light, he realized that the man in front of him was clearly a half-orc, and he was saying something about fava beans and a nice Chianti. Hej didn't know what Chianti was, but he knew enough to be terrified. A pair of giant hands reached into the box and lifted him up, to the delighted gasps of the audience. He saw a crowd of faces, all dressed in finery, staring at him in gleeful anticipation, and a tabletop with a pair of huge carving knives on it just a few feet away. The half-orc, grinning and smacking his lips, set Hej down on the table and picked up a knife. He cut a square out of the boy's shirt, also catching one of the ropes that bound him and sloppily cutting fairly deep into the boy's skin. Hej screamed into his gag. Then the half-orc leaned over and picked up a giant salt shaker, to the crowd's great amusement. "Not so fast, you monster!" shouted a voice from across the stage. The boy couldn't see who had said that, but the orc turned around. Hejarin's heart leapt for a second: was someone coming to save him? But then the two started shouting awkwardly worded statements at each other, and he knew this was just part of the play. He wouldn't live through this nightmare unless he did something about it. Somehow, he hardly knew how, he managed to free his hands. The rope the half-orc had cut had loosened everything else enough for him to squeeze his hands out. He pulled out his gag, grabbed the other knife still on the table, and slashed the bonds around his legs. Then, without any conscious consideration at all, he leapt off the table and plunged the knife into the half-orc's back. The theater screamed, and Hej sprinted for the door before anyone knew what to do. Anyone except for Crasius Estemon, that is, the tall man in a cloak near the door. He leapt to his feet as Hej went by, quickly caught up with the boy on the street (thanks to his much larger legs), and grabbed him. Then, suddenly, they were invisible, and the handful of armed men who came pouring out of the theater ran right past them. Once they were gone, Crasius carried Hejarin to a nearby alleyway and told him he liked the boy's moxie, and he could use someone like him in his organization. Hej protested that he just wanted to get home to his brother and uncle, but Crasius told him that he didn't have that option: Cato, the owner of the theater, surely already had the guards looking for him, and only Crasius would be able to get him safely out. Besides, Hej owed him; Crasius had just saved his life. And so they set off for yet another city, Crasius's hometown, the northwestern port city of Kintargo, where Hej joined the man's small guild of spies and assassins. He was the only child there, but he learned the arts of thievery, sneakery, and how to fight, he did the tasks he could be entrusted with, and made friends among the older members. Since Crasius told Hej that if he ran away he would put a price on his head, he never tried to get back to Egorian, and gradually it felt less and less urgent. When Hej was fifteen, Crasius and several of the senior members were killed on a particularly dangerous job, attempting to steal some sort of artifact from a group of Varisian adventurers staying in town for a minor noble house who claimed it was their ancestral property. Although he had friends among the other spies, Hej didn't want to be involved in the infighting that he was sure would follow, and he slipped out on a ship to Egorian. But when he reached the city, he found no sign of his brother or his uncle. It had been eight years, after all. Now feeling truly alone in the world, Hej drifted around the city for a time. One night, he got to talking with a stranger in a tavern, and ended up telling the story of a scam or two he had pulled in his youth. The stranger was amused by the tales, and told a few of her own. By the end of the night, Hejarin's partnership with Radaya had begun. Category:PCs Category:People Category:The Folk Gang